Zhao Mingyue lay sprawled over the dining table, eating the bowl of egg noodles she’d just made, her cheeks puffing out with each bite. She still stole glances at Bai Yu, who stood in front of the TV.
After gulping down the last of the noodles, Zhao Mingyue couldn’t hold back any longer. “Um, is there something wrong with my staff? It feels like you’ve been staring at it. If it’s no good, I can find another weapon?”
Ever since she’d brought out this staff, Bai Yu had seemed very interested. And indeed, she was. Hearing her voice, Bai Yu shook her head. “No, don’t change it. This staff is perfectly adequate.”
This thing was a full meter long and solid to boot, weighing a surprising seven or eight jin. It could double as a hammer. You couldn’t smash a ghost with it, but one hit to a person? They might not be able to take it. A single swing could break a leg.
“What I’m curious about is, why do you have this thing?”
If Zhao Mingyue had pulled out a hammer, Bai Yu wouldn’t have been surprised. But this item…
Its appearance was as cute as its lethality was great. You couldn’t exactly say it wasn’t suitable for a young girl. Bai Yu couldn’t help but imagine the scene: Zhao Mingyue, staff in hand, facing down a group of cross-dressing perverts, smashing them down one hammer-blow at a time.
Zhao Mingyue felt a bit embarrassed. She walked over and grabbed the staff. “I bought this years ago when I went to an anime convention. I didn’t expect it to be so heavy. I usually use it to hammer nails. And, well, you said I needed a weapon. I figured this could work.”
“A weapon is necessary, because it won’t just be ghosts coming tonight. I can’t protect you at every moment. You must have something for self-defense.” Bai Yu’s gaze returned to Zhao Mingyue.
One thing was certain: it wouldn’t just be Lu Liangting and his “cousin” showing up tonight. Other game participants would certainly come. These people might be there to protect Lu Liangting, or perhaps to assassinate Zhao Mingyue. Regardless of their purpose, they were enemies.
“Ah, not just ghosts? There will be other people? Lu Liangting and the others?”
“And others besides them. I can tell you, they are a group of utter lunatics. Compared to them, ghosts are nothing.”
At Bai Yu’s words, Zhao Mingyue involuntarily recalled the look in the eyes of Lu Liangting’s cousin, Xia Han. It was truly chilling, an indescribable feeling.
“Then what do we do?”
“Just be careful. Remember, tonight, no matter who you meet, if someone intentionally approaches you, you must keep your distance and counter-attack immediately.”
“Mm, I’ll remember!” Zhao Mingyue nodded firmly. She was already nervous, and Bai Yu’s words only made her more tense.
“Trust no one. The only one you can trust is yourself.”
Bai Yu gave her this final reminder. She wouldn’t have said all this if it weren’t Zhao Mingyue’s first real mission. With a few steps, she melted into Zhao Mingyue’s shadow, and the room returned to silence.
It was now ten past nine. Seeing Bai Yu was ignoring her, Zhao Mingyue tidied up the dining table and went back to her bedroom. She booted up her computer and began searching for any information related to Tomorrow Apartment.
She had searched before, but never found anything useful. However, when she replaced the keyword “Sunshine Apartment” with “Tomorrow Apartment,” a flood of old posts surfaced. They were either about the fire from that year or the supernatural encounters netizens had experienced there.
Some talked about seeing someone jump from the fifth floor of Tomorrow Apartment in the middle of the night; after calling the police, the person mysteriously vanished.
Others had seen Tomorrow Apartment on fire at midnight, only for the vision to disappear in a flash, replaced by a woman standing on the fifth floor, staring at them.
Some had passed by at night and suddenly felt a chilling wind. Turning around, they saw over a dozen people on the fifth floor, staring down at them in unison—a truly eerie sight.
One netizen claimed he had stayed there for a single night. He was woken by the sound of footsteps. He initially ignored it, but the footsteps grew louder and more persistent.
When he opened his door to see who was walking around, he saw a Headless Old Man walking backwards on the stairs, endlessly climbing up and down. Upon noticing him, the Headless Old Man rapidly approached, practically running backwards down the stairs.
The netizen was so terrified he slammed the door shut, and then came the knocking.
The knocking lasted the entire night, only vanishing at the first light of dawn. The netizen, scared sleepless, moved out the very next day.
The more she read, the more horrified she became. If she’d known about these things before renting, she wouldn’t have taken this place no matter how cheap it was. It was simply too terrifying. Since the incident, this place seemed to have become a kind of taboo zone—netizens wouldn’t even mention it casually.
Thinking that she’d be making contact with these Ghostly Monsters tonight, Zhao Mingyue’s face turned bitter.
She was just an ordinary high school girl. How could a short two-day holiday open the door to a completely different world?
“Can’t be afraid. I have a helper. Can’t be afraid. It’s fine, it will be fine!”
She cheered herself on internally, counting herself somewhat lucky. She lived here, on the fourth floor, and hadn’t encountered much strangeness in all this time. Though, come to think of it… that sound of footsteps going up and down the stairs—she really did seem to hear it often.
Shutting down the computer, Zhao Mingyue pulled back the curtain and stood by the window. Before long, she saw a car drive over and stop downstairs.
“Lu Liangting?”
Coming to Tomorrow Apartment by taxi at this hour? Her first thought was Lu Liangting.
“I wonder why he’s coming to such a strange place. Does he also want to find someone?”
“The sky is completely dark. Just over an hour until the mission begins.”
“The quest tells me to survive until dawn within Tomorrow Apartment. What if I just never leave my room? Wouldn’t staying at home still count as being in the apartment? Except… the completion rating would be low, like in a game.”
Zhao Mingyue kept pondering, analyzing every detail of the quest.
“For a high completion rating, those ‘sub-tasks’ must be the key. But how to complete them? It doesn’t say the objectives. Or do I just experience them?”
“Wait, do I have to kill these Ghostly Monsters? Or fulfill their wishes?”
“Forget it, no point overthinking. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Just don’t stay home. Believe in yourself!”
“But then again, I’ve already accepted the quest. Staying home definitely isn’t safe either. Rather than letting these ghosts into my room, it’s better to just go outside.”
After mulling it over, Zhao Mingyue decided to stall for time first, listen to the noises outside, and observe what Lu Liangting and his group were doing. Going out at midnight wouldn’t be too late.
Just as this thought settled, the lights in her room suddenly went out. The room, along with the corridor outside, plunged into darkness.
“Another blackout?”
